Egypt's Foreign Minister Mohammed Kamel Amr and U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced that a ceasefire deal has been reached between Israel and Hamas. It went into effect at 9 p.m. local time (2 p.m. EST).

"Israel shall stop all hostilities in the Gaza Strip land sea and air, including incursions and targeting of individuals.

"All Palestinian factions shall stop all hostilities from the Gaza Strip against Israel, including rocket attacks and all attacks along the border.

"Opening the crossings and facilitating the movement of people and transfer of goods and refraining from restricting residents' free movements and targeting residents in border areas. Procedures of implementation shall be dealt with after 24 hours from the start of the ceasefire.

"Egypt shall receive assurances from each party that the party commits to what was agreed upon.

"Each party shall commit itself not to perform any acts that would breach this understanding. In case of any observations, Egypt as a sponsor of this understanding, shall be informed to follow up."

Here's what Benjamin Netanyahu had to say:

PM Netanyahu: Israel can't sit idly by when the terror organizations are rearming themselves - we will cooperate with US on this issue

Earlier Palestinian sources told Haaretz that a cease-fire would not be announced on Wednesday because Israel refused to include the lifting of the Gaza navl blockade as a term in the truce agreement. Israelwon't lift the blockade, which was an original demand of Hamas.

More than 160 Palestinians have died and more than 1200 have been wounded while five Israelis have died and dozens have been wounded during the eight days of Israel's Operation Pillar of Cloud.